Sony is calling the Z4 the Xperia Z3+ outside of Japan

Were you looking forward to the launch of the Sony Xperia Z4? Well, the smartphone isn’t coming out over here in the UK – not under that name, at any rate.

Yes, oddly enough Sony has announced the decision to call its next flagship phone the Sony Xperia Z3+ everywhere except Japan – that’s the only territory where it will be known as the Sony Xperia Z4.

Fortunately, the Xperia Z3+ won’t be any different in terms of the specs, and the only difference will be the moniker.

As far as the Z4/Z3+ spec goes, Sony is sticking with a 5.2in screen and a resolution of 1920 x 1080, although the processor is being upgraded to a Snapdragon 810, which should really fly given the display it's driving (the Z3 was already extremely quick with a Snapdragon 801 under the hood).

3GB of RAM will be on board as with the Z3, and Sony is also sticking with the 20.7 megapixel camera – some may be a little disappointed that the company hasn’t beefed the snapper up. However, the front camera has seen a boost to 5.1 megapixels, following the trend to please selfie addicts.

An Xperia Z4 Compact is also coming with a smaller 4.7in screen, so presumably that will be called the Xperia Z3+ Compact, which is a little bit of a mouthful.

The reason for the name change? It would seem to be reflective of the fact that this year’s model isn’t a major update to the handset, although why Sony is keeping the Z4 name for Japan, well, that’s another question.

The Xperia Z3+ will be out next month across the globe in both single-SIM and dual-SIM flavours, in black and white colours, plus copper and aqua green.